This series of posts is dedicated to the many, many six packs, pony kegs and pints that have sauntered into my life at one point or another.

Recently, I and my partner-in-all-things attended a beer sampling event in our current city of residence. We followed that with a stop at a nearby watering hole, where we engaged in an impromptu debrief session. As I was sipping on the New Glarus Brewing Company beer I bought, I was doing my best to sort through which of the middling offerings from our prior stop were worth remembering. My lovely and wise drinking buddy argued, “Why are you worrying about that? You know you can just order New Glarus.” As usual, she was correct. I was further reminded of the soundness of this stance earlier this week when I finally got my hands on some bottles of their new offering Bubbler. (For those who operate outside of America’s Dairyland, the name refers to the common Wisconsin vernacular for a drinking fountain, a piece of terminology so beloved that no less than three state breweries are currently using it.) The New Glarus Brewing Company Bubbler is a hefeweizen, and it’s a practically ideal example of the style, the sort of beer so well crafted that it could be used as a teaching tool. For anyone taking their own shot at a hefeweizen, this is the target to hit. That offers a fair summary as to why I’m pleased to be back in the only state where New Glarus beers can be bought. It’s not that they do anything all that bold or crazily inventive. Instead, whatever beer they set out to brew, they are sure to do it to perfection.

Previous entries in this series can be found by clicking on the “Beers I Have Known” tag.